


Holding Patterns

by suburbanmotel



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Hopeful Ending, Anxiety, Best Friends, Blow Jobs, Boys In Love, Boys Kissing, Friends to Lovers, Hand Jobs, Hockey Suspension, Idiots in Love, M/M, Quarantine, Sharing a Bed, Talk of Pandemic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-27
Updated: 2020-03-27
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:48:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23337907
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/suburbanmotel/pseuds/suburbanmotel
Summary: //“Being between one thing or condition and another.” Tyler’s voice is quieter now. The words hang between them.Oh.“Being between one thing and another,” Tyler says again, the phone close against his ear and mouth now. “Well, that’s us, isn’t it. That’s us.”//
Relationships: Jamie Benn/Tyler Seguin
Comments: 43
Kudos: 181
Collections: Bennguin Quarantine Fest 2020





	Holding Patterns

//

_to have or keep in the hand; keep fast; grasp_

Long before everything goes sideways Tyler knows how he feels. He doesn’t need some apocalyptic event to kick-start his heart, so to speak. Right since the beginning they’ve fit and it’s been so _easy_ he wonders about people who say relationships are so much work. How hard they are. He remembers his sisters asking their mom over and over, How do you know? How do you know when you’ve met The One?

You just know, his mom said, over and over. Tyler listened in on those conversations as he met people, boys and girls, and hooked up with people, boys and girls, through his teens, early 20s. He had fun. He _always_ had fun, but not once did he think about The One, and it didn’t bother him. It would happen or it wouldn’t and if he was honest with himself, he really didn’t care one way or another.

And then he goes to Dallas.

And it’s hot and he’s hurting and confused and angry and he doesn’t want to _be_ there so very far from home, but then there’s Jamie and immediately something just settles in his chest and his heart opens big as the cloudless sky and he can breathe for the first time in years it seems.

When he wraps his arms around Jamie after a goal and holds on so tight. When Jamie looks at him and smiles at him and Tyler catches him watching from across the locker room or across the ice or, eventually, across the interior of the car before and after practice.

They fit on the ice and off, they fit when Jamie’s mood goes dark and Tyler is frustrated and missing home. They fit when they lose and when they win, and during the long, hot dusty summers, bouncing back and forth between Texas and Canada, never going more than a day without touching base by text or phone call. They _fit_.

And when Tyler one night on his couch after a particularly bad game slides his hand into Jamie’s fingers against fingers and palm against palm and Jamie’s head lolls against the back of the couch and he exhales, long and soft. He means only to comfort but Jamie looks at him and Tyler looks back and something else, something unnameable, slips into place with a soft, final click.

“Yeah?” Tyler says quietly. Jamie looks at him and holds on even tighter. He nods.

“Yeah,” Jamie says and tugs just a bit, enough to let Tyler know. Tyler shifts and climbs into Jamie’s lap, legs straddling his, settling in close, the whir and hum of the air conditioning heavy around them and Tyler kisses him for the first time. They’ve been playing together so easy for over a year, and they know each other like no one else, Tyler thinks, but they’ve never done _this_. It should feel new. It should feel _weird_. But Jamie’s lips under his, soft soft soft, don’t feel so new at all and it’s good. It’s as familiar as Jamie’s voice and his laugh and it’s incredible and Tyler, who is impatient and hates waiting for anything, wonders why they waited this long at all. Tyler smiles because he can’t help it. He wraps his hands around the back of Jamie’s neck and presses his face to the side of Jamie’s face. Jamie’s hands clasp around Tyler’s lower back, on the skin under his T-shirt, and pull him even closer.

“Yeah,” Tyler says again.

When do you know you’ve met The One? Sometimes Tyler thinks about asking his mom but when he slid his hand into Jamie’s and everything fit and Jamie held on just as tightly, he realizes he knows the answer already.

Some days, he thinks, it’s like he’s always known.

//

_a controlling force or dominating influence: to have a hold on a person_

Tyler’s kind of like a drug, Jamie thinks when he allows himself to think about what’s going on between them at all. He’s loud and he’s fast and he’s fun and he’s addictive. He’s a force of nature, several forces of nature really, like a tsunami, a hurricane, an earthquake all rolled up together in a beautiful vibrant body.

He arches his back when he comes and laughs and pushes his face into the side of Jamie’s neck. His hands are big and his fingers are long and they shake when Jamie slides into him, neck twisting and tendons bared.

He covers Jamie like a blanket of sinew and muscle and kisses with a heat and intensity Jamie comes to associate with long Texas summers, filling his mouth, slick on his tongue.

He looks for Tyler everywhere, knows where he is on the ice and in the locker room and at practice and at home. He knows his every mood and eyebrow lift and smile, the hitch in his voice, the stroke of his hand, his lips his hips his ankles.

“I love you,” he says, voice raspy, as he slides into Tyler, hips stuttering, eyelashes fluttering.

“I love you,” he says when Tyler emerges from the shower naked, dripping water, shaking his hair all over him, his phone, his clean, dry shirt. He means to say, You’re an annoying pain in my ass grow up, but somehow that’s not what emerges.

“Yeah, I love you,” he says as Tyler jumps on his back, hangs off him like a monkey, laughs so loud right into his ear that it actually hurts and follows it with a squeeze and a kiss so gentle and kind it makes Jamie’s eyes prick.

Jamie is obsessed, he’s heartsick, he knows what he looks like when he looks at Tyler and it’s getting more difficult to pretend to everyone around them that he’s not completely desperately in love. The bigger issue is that he just doesn’t care. He can’t stop and he can’t stay away and it’s becoming.

It’s becoming a _pattern_ is what it’s becoming, thinks Jamie, because he can’t give him up and he can’t imagine not having him in his life anymore and anything Tyler wants, Jamie wants to give him because Jamie’s never been good at saying no to Tyler.

//

_the action of a player wrapping his arms around an opponent or using a free hand to clutch, grab or hold the stick, jersey or body on the opponent_

Tyler gets slammed twice by MacKinnon in the first period and Jamie slams him right back. Tyler hears more than sees the unmistakable sound of two big bodies hitting the boards and he knows exactly what has happened and why.

When it happens _again_ in the second, Tyler’s heart stutters. Moments later Jamie’s got a hand around MacKinnon’s arm, his stick, he’s pulled him close, yanking him backwards, heads close, mouth moving, something along the lines of _knock it the fuck off,_ Tyler thinks. But, he’s only guessing. Jamie will never tell him what he’s said but his face is enraged, twisted, deadly.

It’s two for holding and Jamie doesn’t bat an eye. He looks pretty fucking pleased with himself, in fact, when the camera shows him in the box.

Tyler slides over on the bench twice, shoving Guri hard to make room for Jamie after his penalty. He nudges Jamie’s knee sharply and Jamie cuts a glance at him, shrugs a bit and _smirks_ and Tyler grins like an idiot.

Jamie’s very good at hockey, Tyler knows. He good at pretty much every aspect of it, even when his temper gets the best of him, and his temper always gets the best of him when it comes to Tyler getting roughed up or pushed around or messed with. Jamie’s very good at hockey but he’s also very good at lots of things.

He’s good at hugs and cooking and back rubs. He’s good at organizing pantries and schedules and life in general. He’s good at calming Tyler down and cheering him up. He’s good at being reliable and steady and steadfast and unflappable. He’s good at reading Tyler’s moods and he’s very good at reading Tyler’s body.

Later, when they’re alone, when Jamie is naked and between Tyler’s splayed legs, head moving with purpose, slow and deliberate, tongue and lips and hands and fingers, Tyler says, more to the ceiling than anything,

“You did that for me, didn’t you.”

Jamie stops moving and Tyler groans. Jamie looks up and his eyes are very dark and his lips are wet.

He smiles and says, just before he lower his head again, “You’re welcome.”

//

_in wrestling, a method of seizing an opponent and keeping him in control_

“What are you doing?”

Jamie’s looking at him, of course. He’s watching him, like he always is and Tyler has his phone out, like he often does.

“I don’t have nearly enough photos of us together.”

Jamie makes a face. Jamie hates having his photo taken. Tyler knows this. Everyone knows this. It’s become a game, for Tyler, to get photos of him when he’s not looking, sneaky shots of him reading or cooking or sleeping. They’re for him alone, for Tyler, stowed away in a secret folder on his phone, photos he looks at when they’re not together, when they have to be apart. Tyler treasures them. Jamie hates them, even though he’s never asked Tyler to delete them, not once. When Tyler gleefully shows him Jamie makes that face and rolls his eyes and groans and says, why, and Tyler says, every time, because you’re so fucking beautiful, and he means it, but he also loves to see Jamie’s face go red.

“You have enough. More than enough,” Jamie says

“That’s a lie,” Tyler says. He flops on the couch next to him, slinging his legs over Jamie’s and leaning up so close Jamie can feel hot breath on his neck. “I have lots of _you_. Singular. Not _us_. Plural.” He shoves his phone into Jamie’s face displaying the latest he took. Jamie looking out the kitchen window at god knows what. It was early morning a few days ago, dreary November light. There’s a pensive almost dreamy look on his face. His hair is ungelled and soft and Tyler’s done something to the filter to make it all even softer. Jamie makes a face but he doesn’t hate it.

“You look so handsome,” Tyler says, touching the image with one finger. “Dimple,” he says, then looks up at Jamie, open and awed and fuck, Jamie would give him anything, anything at all.

Except a selfie.

Tyler is already angling the phone to capture the two of them, one arm holding his phone the other clamping tight on Jamie who squirms and twists and laughs when Tyler’s fingers dig into his ribs.

“No,” Jamie says.

“Yes,” Tyler says, poking harder.

“Stop,” Jamie says, trying to sound stern but it’s difficult when he’s wheezing.

“ _You_ stop,” Tyler says, climbing on top of him fully, bracketing his thighs and sitting down hard. “Hold _still_. I just want a photo of the two of us.”

But Jamie isn’t giving in. He always gives in and right now he’s not. He’s made his decision and he’s sticking to it because. Well because Tyler needs to learn the concept of the word no. And personal space, too, but that’s a lesson for another day.

Jamie’s bigger but Tyler’s wiry and lean and fucking _determined_.

“Don’t be a baby,” Tyler says. His phone is forgotten now, and his original mission it seems as limbs flail and Tyler digs his knees into Jamie’s hips.

“Don’t be a pest,” Jamie says, working his hands under Tyler’s shirt and pinching at his hip bones.

Tyler makes a sound between a shout and a scream, twists violently and yanks them both off the couch onto the floor. They lie there, panting and shell-shocked and just as Jamie is about to call truce and let him take the fucking photo already, Tyler recovers and _keeps going_ , climbing up on top of Jamie and getting him in a lock, flat on his back on the floor, arms pinned above his head, together all the way down. Jamie is tensing but he’s not moving, not anymore, and Tyler doubts he’s really trying because he knows Jamie’s strength, he knows what those broad shoulders and wide chest and long thighs are capable of and Tyler knows he can’t pin Jamie this long without a struggle. Jamie lies there, breathing hard, looking up at Tyler with those eyes, mouth slightly parted, waiting.

Tyler tilts his head.

“Give?” he says. Jamie pauses, shakes his head no, but he still doesn’t move. Tyler pushes down harder, groin to groin, hardness there against hardness. Jamie sucks in a breath and almost bucks Tyler off him, but Tyler holds on tighter to Jamie’s wrists with his hands, tightens his knees against Jamie’s hips.

“ _Give?_ ” Tyler says again. His voice has gone hoarse. He presses down again, harder. They’re both hard now, painful, impossible. He leans down close, closer, his nose against Jamie’s cheekbone, lips brushing along his jaw, down to his chin, ghosting across his lips and up the other side. Jamie’s head goes back. Tyler can feel his breath and his groan deep in the chest.

“You want me to stop?” Tyler whispers into Jamie’s hair as he moves his hips again, pressing down and holding tight.

Jamie closes his eyes tight, breathing through his nose and then his mouth. He can’t catch his breath and he can’t slow his heart. He’s so hard and Tyler’s so hard. Tyler leans down close and speaks right into Jamie’s ear.

“Jamie. Do you want me to stop?” He rolls his hips again because he’s Tyler and he seems to live to drive Jamie slightly insane. Jamie manages to shake his head no no _no_. Tyler rolls his hips again and again and he’s panting now, sweat beading along his hairline, curls spread over his forehead. He works his sweatpants down over his hips with jerky movements, eyes down as he pulls Jamie’s down too, then grasps both their cocks in one hand, working them together fast and Jamie just about loses his mind. His tries to hold onto the floor beneath him, the coffee table leg beside him, Tyler’s tense, trembling thighs, anything. Their breaths, hard and heavy, fill the space between them and in less than a minute Jamie is coming with a low bit-back shout and Tyler tumbles right behind him.

“Tyler. Jesus. Fuck.” Jamie tries to gather his wits and his breath and his heartbeat while Tyler ignores the mess and collapses beside him, a tangle of loose limbs. Jamie closes his eyes. Tyler presses his lips to Jamie’s cheek. There’s a flash of light behind Jamie’s eyelids, a faint click of a camera and Jamie wants to laugh at the absurdity of it all, he wants to object, but he knows it’s pointless because Jamie’s never been good at saying no to Tyler.

//

_to set aside; reserve or retain_

Tyler forgets sometimes. He’s a handsy person. He likes to touch, to poke, to lean. He likes to wrap his arms around people and hug them hard. He does it to everyone but he does it to Jamie the most. He doesn’t think about it, how others might see it because it’s natural, it’s second nature. It’s Jamie and he loves Jamie.

“We gotta be careful,” Jamie says and Tyler knows by “we” he means “you.” Jamie’s not making eye contact and his voice is Captain Serious but his hands shake, just a bit.

“Careful about what?” Tyler asks. He knows about what.

“People are noticing. They’re asking questions.”

“What people? What questions?” Tyler says, but he knows. They’ve been through this before and they’ll be through it again. Jamie is always more reserved, it’s in his nature but Tyler has to work harder to reign it in. He hates sitting still, he hates waiting, he hates hiding. But he loves Jamie, so.

“Tyler,” Jamie says and he sounds sorry.

“Yeah,” Tyler says, to make Jamie stop sounding like any of this is his fault, that they can’t be honest about it, can’t let everyone know. Like he has any control over any of it.

“Just,” Jamie starts. He blows out a breath.

“I know,” Tyler says, and he does. “I’ll try to control myself.”

“Ty—”

“I can’t help it that you’re so goddamn attractive.”

“ _Tyler_.”

Tyler grins but his hands are slightly sweaty. “I’ll tone it down. Promise. I’ll take it from here—” he lifts one hand up high, above his head. “—to here.” He moves it down low, below his waist. He considers, then moves it back up. “Don’t want to be too obvious though. Somewhere in here. Like. I’ll be in the middle.”

Jamie sighs.

“I just,” Tyler starts. His eyes dart around, checking to see who’s watching, who might overhear. Jamie hates it. “I just want everyone to know. How I feel about you.” He stops. “It’s just really fucking hard sometimes.”

He smiles at Jamie then, but not his usual toothy, open smile and it just about breaks Jamie’s heart.

He texts Jamie late that night, after midnight.

 _Inbetween_ , he writes. _That’s the word I was looking for. Inbetween. I’ll be inbetween._

 _It’s two words, Tyler,_ comes the reply. _In between. Or In-between. Not inbetween_

There’s a long pause and Jamie wonders if Tyler has fallen asleep. He’s just dozing off himself when his phone _rings_.

“A person or thing that is between two extremes, two contrasting conditions,” Tyler says. He’s on speakerphone and he’s reading from the dictionary it seems. Jamie smiles up at his bedroom ceiling in the dark and rubs a hand over his face. This guy. This _boy_. He’s wriggled his way so deep into the slats between Jamie’s ribs there’s no getting him out now.

“Ok,” Jamie says.

“Being between one thing, condition, etc., and another.” Tyler’s voice is quieter now. The words hang between them.

Oh.

“Being between one thing and another,” Tyler says again, the phone close against his ear and mouth now. “Well, that’s us, isn’t it. That’s us.”

//

_a traffic pattern for aircraft at a specified location_

There’s a thunderstorm and then there’s waiting. A lot of waiting, it seems.

It’s Vancouver, so the weather is crap, of course, and by Jamie’s estimation they should have landed half an hour ago, but their plane is circling and rocking, buffeted by winds that shake and rattle the plane alarmingly.

After the third pass Jamie gives up trying to appear nonchalant, fastens his belt and grips the armrests. Another jolt, another drop. He puts his head back and closes his eyes, swallows once, twice, hard.

“Hey.” Tyler slips into the seat beside him. His tie is loose, top shirt button undone. His cheeks are flushed. Jamie opens his eyes, cuts them to the side, doesn’t move, doesn’t release his grip. He’s not a nervous flyer, he can’t afford to be with all the travel they do, but this. This always gets to him on some level.

“You ok?” he says quietly, nudging Jamie’s knee with his own. He knows Jamie’s not. He knows he hates this because he knows Jamie better than pretty much anyone now.

Jamie doesn’t answer. He looks out the window again, then away, then back again.

“Just waiting for the weather to clear, and there’s a backup on the runway,” Tyler says. “That’s the rumour anyway. Won’t be long.” His voice is calm, not a hiccup of worry, no lie to detect. He really does seem completely unconcerned. Jamie lets his shoulders down a tiny bit. He bites his lip.

The plane banks again. He looks at Tyler without moving his head.

Tyler looks around. No one is paying attention. Rads and Esa are on their phones and Miro and Roope are talking together several rows back. Tyler leans close, arms together, and puts his hand on Jamie’s, anchoring him against his tensed thigh.

“This ok?” Tyler says quietly. “I don’t wanna.” He stops and looks suddenly unsure. “You know.”

Jamie nods. It’s ok. It’s always ok. He doesn’t want Tyler to ever think it’s not ok ever again but he can’t say any of that because his voice has suddenly stopped working.

Tyler nods and tightens his grasp, wrapping his long fingers around Jamie’s clenched fist and squeezing hard. The plane finally, finally starts to descend. Then it shakes again, drops again.

“Hold on,” Jamie whispers. He hates this part.

“I am,” Tyler says.

“Don’t let go.”

“Jamie,” Tyler says, moving even closer, so close his nose is in Jamie’s neck. “Look at me.”

Jamie looks. He finds kind brown eyes and a smile, more gentle than the usual open mouthed grin. 

“I won’t let go. Promise.”

//

_to remain or continue in a specified state, relation_

“So we’re doing this, right?”

Once, when things really did get too hard, they tried a real break. Weeks and weeks and weeks, near the end of the season and stretching into the summer months. It’s too hard, Jamie had said, working hard to make his voice steady. Too distracting. We need to. We need to focus on the game. You see that, right? Right? Jamie was pleading by that point.

Yeah, Tyler said and he sounded broken. He sounded like Jamie had broken his fucking _heart_ and Jamie wanted to tell him he was breaking his own right along with it.

And it was awful, it was terrible and by the end of June it was too much and it wasn’t worth it. And here they were, in Tyler’s back yard, trying to make it ok again.

“Jamie, we’re doing this, right?” 

Tyler looks up at Jamie, squinting in the too-bright sun. It’s late afternoon and it’s at an awkward angle, right in his eyes, nearly blinding him. He left his sunglasses inside earlier when they were fucking and when they stumbled back out to throw themselves in the pool he was too lazy to go back.

Cash is nosing around, threatening to push Tyler back on his ass, which would be pretty funny, but Tyler has excellent balance and core strength, so he stays put. Gerry sprawled in the shade of the umbrella and Marshall is lapping water from the silver bowl. Tyler is rubbing Cash’s neck while he looks up, waiting. His hair is loose, curly, falling over his forehead and Jamie’s breath catches in his throat before he can reply.

He thinks of Tyler on the ice and in his bed, equally vibrant in both places. He thinks of Tyler grinning at him wild and alive, of his twitches and tics, he thinks of Tyler pressing the softest kisses to Jamie’s bruised skin, his fingers under Jamie’s chin, lips on his eyelids. He thinks of Tyler’s long, lean body beneath his, arching and grasping. He thinks of Tyler sprawling on the couch across from him, bored while Jamie reads or fiddles on his phone or goes over plays, throwing a balled up stinky sock at his head and yelling, Pay attention to me! He thinks of Tyler laughing, always. He thinks of every single word and sound and misunderstanding and he looks at Tyler’s beautiful face, soft and open and waiting and there’s only one answer, of course, there’s only one way to proceed here.

“Yeah,” Jamie says at last, releasing the word that had been waiting there all along. He pushes one toe into the dirt, watches it give, feels Tyler’s eyes on his face. He can feel his smile, feel his relief. His heart thuds hard against his ribs. “Yeah. We’re doing this.”

//

_to remain fast; adhere; cling_

They get the call in mid-March, late at night, Jamie first, who reaches out to everyone else, Tyler last.

“How long?” Tyler is muzzy-headed. He was deeply asleep, dogs spread across the bed at every angle. His legs are trapped by Gerry and Cash on each side and Marshall lies along his right side. He fumbles his phone and relaxes when he hears Jamie’s voice, quiet and steady on the other end.

“Don’t know,” Jamie says. “Couple weeks at least but.”

Tyler waits. Jamie exhales.

“It’ll be more. I don’t see how it won’t be more.”

They’re quiet together. Tyler rubs a hand over his face.

“You worried?” Jamie’s always worried but Tyler needs to ask.

Jamie hesitates a beat too long.

“Nah,” he says but his voice is faint. He clears his throat and tries again. “Nope. It’s going to be ok.”

“Can you.” Tyler starts and stops. He bites his lip hard. “Can you come over.”

“Yeah,” Jamie says immediately. They spend many nights at each other’s houses but tonight Jamie had had meetings, captain stuff. Things were brewing, had been for days but now it was here. Now it was real. “Yeah of course. If you want me to.”

Tyler squeezes his eyes shut. He feels, ridiculously, like he’s going to cry. Everything is a mess and he doesn’t have a fucking clue what’s going on or what he wants except for one thing.

“Yeah. I want you to.”

Tyler is dozing when Jamie slides into his bed half an hour later, mattress dipping sharply, blankets lifting. Jamie smells like outside air, and his skin, when Tyler finds it, is cool to the touch. Jamie is still shifting to get comfortable when Tyler wraps himself around him, every inch of their bodies pressed together, Tyler’s face smushed against Jamie’s chest.

“Hey,” Jamie says. He runs his hands up and down Tyler’s back while Tyler _clings_ to him. He can barely breathe and Jamie’s chest hair tickles but he doesn’t care. “Hey, Tyler. It’s gonna be ok.”

Tyler nods and laughs a little. “Yeah I know.” He’s holding on so tight he’s probably hurting Jamie, so he loosens his grip a tiny bit. Jamie laughs too.

“Thanks,” he says, taking a deep breath.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Tyler says and he is, he’s so glad and even though he knows Jamie is really here in his bed and his life and isn’t going anywhere, he still can’t let go.

//

_something to grasp, especially for support_

“Should we go home?”

They’re sprawled together on Jamie’s couch, watching the news, watching report after report until Tyler feels he could crawl out of his skin.

Jamie shakes his head and shrugs. He doesn’t know. No one knows. Tyler thinks of his mom and dad and sisters. He thinks of Ontario. He thinks of Jamie across the country in Victoria, so far away, and he curls in on himself.

“We’ll stay here,” he says and it feels good, it feels better, it feels like _something_ , to have made that decision.

They drive to Wal-Mart, miles away from where they live, late late, dressed in hoodies and ball caps, faces wan and too white in the fluorescent light. They fill their cart with food, some healthy, some not, water, dog food. They walk slowly and carefully, pressed close together, murmuring in quiet voices. This? Do we need this? Yeah. Ok.

They drive home slowly, windows down and Tyler looks out at the rolling landscape, looks over at Jamie as he drives and thinks about the word home.

They’re ok, they’re ok. They have food, they have the dogs, they have each other.

They sleep, they eat, they watch TV and endless movies. They work out in Jamie’s gym. They fuck and sleep for hours tangled and sweaty and when they wake up they have sex again, slower.

Tyler stops counting the days after the 10th. It doesn’t matter, he supposes. They Skype with their families, they lie wrapped together in front of the TV, they argue like they’ve always done but now it has even less heat than before. It doesn’t matter about being right, Tyler says which makes Jamie laugh.

“That’s because you’re wrong,” he says, then kisses him, quick, to shut him up.

“Hey,” Tyler whispers late at night into the back of Jamie’s neck. He smells like soap, he smells like sex.

“Hmm,” Jamie says. Tyler can feel his voice rumble in his back, down his spine.

“If I had to be quarantined with anyone.”

“Me too.”

The weather turns warm, then warmer. They sit in the backyard, holding hands between the chairs, swinging them lightly every once in a while. The sky turns from wide open blue to a pale orange, red and pink. It’s so quiet. The quiet used to make Tyler want to scream but now. Now he looks over at Jamie’s profile and releases a long breath. Somewhere in the distance he hears a car engine, a door slamming shut, then nothing. There are no planes, no parties, no hockey. Just him and Jamie.

“What now?” he asks.

“Huh?”

“What do we do now?”

Jamie reaches over and takes Tyler’s hand in his. He holds on so tight. He smiles.

“We wait.”

And Tyler’s always hated waiting. He hates waiting and he hates sitting still, but he can do that. He can do that for Jamie.

//

_a state or period in which no progress or change is made or planned_

It’s raining on one of the last perfect days, a day that, of course, no one realizes is one of the last good ones until much later. February is drawing to a close. They beat Chicago. They’re home. They’re home. It’s a good day.

Tyler’s breath is ragged in his throat. Jamie’s face is sweat shiny, mouth open, chest heaving. Grey rain slaps at the window across the room. It’s dark and bright and quiet and loud all at the same time. Tyler sees lights behind his eyelids, sparks shooting.

“Let’s stay like this,” he says.

“Ok.”

“I mean it,” says Tyler, and he sounds serious like he hardly ever does. He slides trembling fingers over Jamie’s stomach. He turns on his side and presses his face into Jamie’s shoulder. He’s still breathing hard, harder than he should be.

“Hey,” Jamie says. He turns to meet Tyler, wraps both arms around him, pulls him close.

“I _mean_ it,” Tyler says into Jamie’s chest. His voice is soft, muffled, sad, intense. “Let’s stay here, let’s stay like this, right here. I don’t wanna move, I don’t wanna go anywhere.”

And Jamie nods. Yeah. The light, the rain, the air of the room, the skin.

“I just feel.” Tyler is restless. Usually after sex he settles, limp and boneless, every inch of his skin sated and soft, even the long muscles and hard bones gone liquid. Tonight he’s fairly thrumming with a tension Jamie can’t pinpoint. He rubs a hand up and down Tyler’s back over the knobs of his spine up to the soft nape of his neck just under the damp curls there to the base of his skull and down again. Up and down to the swell of his ass and back up. Tyler breathes out in a gust, his breath hot on Jamie’s chest but giving him gooseflesh all the same.

“What is it?”

“I feel like something’s coming.”

Jamie hooks two fingers under Tyler’s chin and makes him look up. Tyler’s cheeks are red and his eyes are wet. Jamie is suddenly, inexplicably scared.

“What do you mean?” he says. Tyler blinks and laughs that laugh.

“I love you, you know that, right?” He looks right at Jamie when he says this. Jamie couldn’t look away if he tried.

“I know,” he says. His lips feel numb. “I know that. I know you do.”

“Ok. Good.”

“S’dumb,” he says, settling finally, at last. “I just wanna stay here like this ok? Can we?”

Jamie feels like the _forever_ is sitting there, just behind Tyler’s lips, waiting.

“Ok,” Jamie says, and he means it too, and in that moment it seems possible because he’d do pretty much anything for Tyler. “Ok. We’ll stay here. For as long as you want.”

Jamie’s never been good at saying no to Tyler.

//

**Author's Note:**

> Strange times, strange days. A funny thing happened while writing my Check Please! Big Bang story last year. I went from being not a Hockey Person in the least to being a Hockey Person in the very most. Particularly a Dallas Stars Hockey Person, and particularly a Bennguin Person. And then the lovely bisexualtylerseguin on Tumblr hosted this fest and I thought why not? Because even when I’m _not_ super anxious about life and things in general, writing saves my soul and my sanity. So, here’s a thing I never saw happening. But, there’s a lot of that going around these days.


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